Victor Gruen’s idea of environmental planning: an impossible translation between U.S. and Europe ?

Résumé En

Fifty years ago, Victor Gruen (1903-1980), now relegated as a footnote in most of the histories of architecture of the Twentieth Century, was one of the most influential architects in the occidental part of the world. Recognized as the “father” of the shopping center, Victor Gruen was acclaimed for building new regional shopping centres all over the United-States. On the other side, as early as the mid-fifties, he alerted his contemporaries to the dangerous phenomenon that was hitting most of the American cities, changing them into “doughnuts”: the depopulation of the cores and the increase and development of the suburbs. Born in Vienna, Victor Gruen never forgot his European background and always kept in mind an idealized image of the European city (mainly of its “heart”, or core). His architecture and planning are a transposition/translation of this idealized image in the American urban world, with the hope that it would build a better urban environment (within the city center and the suburb). Back in Europe, mid-sixties, he urged his contemporaries not to reproduce the mistakes made in the United-States, and to focus their attention on the city centres of the old as well as of the new towns being designed. He started a new activity in Vienna and created a foundation (Victor Gruen Association for Environmental Planning), working fervently to brink back life in the city centres while Europeans were dreaming about the American shopping centre.The paper will focus on the second part of his career (during the 1960s) when Gruen worked in France, Belgium, Italy, Swiss, Austria. Its aim will be to question his influence on many projects for new towns or city centres revitalization plans. It is based on researches made on Victor Gruen Papers (Library of Congress) thanks to a Grant from the CASVA (National Gallery of Art, Washington DC).